Original Nova Richard Rider Was Cut From The ‘Guardians Of The Galaxy’ Movie

Undoubtedly the Marvel Comics stories that brought the Guardians of the Galaxy back to the forefront of fans' minds -- and shaped the versions of the characters that appear in the movie that opens next week -- were Annihilation and Annihilation: Conquest.

Those series were also a bit of a revival for another character, Nova. And in a recent interview with ScreenCrush, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige said some early drafts of the Guardians of the Galaxy script included the Richard Rider version of Nova.

Said Feige:

There were some thoughts to it, yes, back in early drafts in the early development stage. But, there was a fork in the road that we came to at one point in the development process where we decided to eliminate Nova and go full-on with Peter Quill’s story.

Interesting that Feige would phrase it that way, given there are four other characters under the Guardians banner (a raccoon, a tree man, a green wrestler, and a green assassin), but it makes sense that the movie would want to pare down its roster of characters to something more manageable and have just one non-alien protagonist. (Though Drax is also human in origin -- in the comics, at least.)

The movie does introduce a movie-universe version of the Nova Corps, with Glenn Close taking on the role of Nova Prime. But if you were expecting Richard Rider to make a cameo, you're probably out of luck, unless he pops up post-credits.